Disconnected Youth

For too many young people the transition to adulthood is characterized by isolation, joblessness, and a lack of educational opportunity or connection to caring community.

In a far-reaching effort to help disconnected youth, nonprofits, foundations, and government agencies across the U.S. are providing support in the form of shelters, job training, mentorship, college prep, job placement, and mental and reproductive health services. But in order to achieve success it is clear that these efforts require greater alignment and coordination.

This special collection gathers the many lessons being learned in the field; lessons about the challenges in meeting the needs of disconnected youth and the promise of both new and more proven approaches.

Arts and CultureChildren and YouthCivil SocietyCommunity and Economic DevelopmentConsumer ProtectionCrime and SafetyEducation and LiteracyEmployment and LaborGovernment ReformHealthHousing and HomelessnessImmigrationMenNonprofits and PhilanthropyParenting and FamiliesPovertyPrison and Judicial ReformRace and Ethnicity

The Palmview Male Cooperative (PMC) is an out-of-school-time program that involves students of color from varied achievement levels in a 'brotherhood' focused on personal excellence, group accountability, and mutual support. This case study shows how participating in this organization impacts Black and Latina/o student engagement. Overall, the authors argue that framing this organization as a Black and Latina/o 'brotherhood' effectively promotes peer bonding, which builds attachment to the larger school community.

In this chapter we briefly review recent trends in employment outcomes for disadvantaged youth, ficusing specifically on those who have become "disconnected" from school and the labor market, and discuss the reasons for these trends. We then review a range of policy presciptions that improve those outcomes, including: efforts to enhance education and employment outcomes among both in-school youth who are at risk of dropping out and becoming disconnected and out-of-school youth who have already done so; policies to increase earnings and increase motivation among youth to participate in the labor force, such as as expanding the eligibility of chidless adults (and especially noncustodial parents, or NCPs) for the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC); and specific policies to reduce barriers to employment faced byb ex-offenders and noncustodial parents.

The term "disconnected youth" refers to young people who have been out of school and out of work for considerable periods of time – like a year or more. They are not temporarily "idle" but are fully disconnected from the mainstream worlds of schooling and work. They may be incarcerated or on parole or probation; they might be aging out of foster care or still attached to their nuclear families. But, overwhelmingly, they come from low-income families and often grow up in poor and relatively segregated neighborhoods. Of all racial and gender groups, young black men are by far the most likely to become "disconnected" from school and work. In the year 2000 – when the labor market was very tight – over 17 percent of all young black men between the ages of 16 and 24 were disconnected, while the comparable percentages for other race/gender groups were much lower. Indeed, this figure implies that one out of every six young black men was disconnected from both school and work at that time.

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